> "I learned to count seconds between echoes,"
"'Cause silence has a sound if you wait long enough."
Elias's voice slid into the second verse like a secret he didn't mean to say out loud.
He didn't look up.
Didn't need to.
The crowd was gone. The gym was gone.
Even Alex — for one breath — was gone.
It was just him, and the truth, and the line coming next:
> "They told me the world would see me someday…"
His throat caught.
He stopped.
One breath short.
A pause.
Too long.
The keys beneath his fingers stayed still.
The silence was deafening — the kind that doesn't wait politely. It leans in.
People shifted in their chairs. A cough. A murmur.
Elias didn't look up.
Didn't move.
And then—
Alex stepped closer.
Not with a look of panic. Not to rescue.
She just picked up the next line.
Not even loud. Just… steady.
> "So I hid behind the songs, hoping they wouldn't look too close."
Her voice slid in over the melody like she'd always been part of it.
Like the song had left space for this moment.
Elias let out a breath.
Then rejoined her on the next chord — softer now, stripped.
No more performance. Just survival.
And the crowd?
Still dead silent.
But it wasn't the kind of silence born from awkwardness.
It was the kind people give when they're afraid to break something sacred.